National Sports Council proposed and expected for 2020

Talks are being had to establish a National Sports Council in the British Virgin Islands by 2020.

This was revealed by Sports Minister Dr Natalio Wheatley during the Sports Beat Magazine radio show with host, Dean ‘The Sportsman’ Greenaway recently.

Minister Wheatley said he believes such an organisation is necessary for the territory to improve the level of sports and to provide greater accountability.

“The sports council that has been proposed; I’m looking at that for 2020 and we can mandate those things. We can say ‘well, what’s your programme?’. Every [local] sporting organisation and federation should have some kind of developmental process, especially if you’re getting funds from government,” Dr Wheatley stated.

He further said: “We want to see your budget for your year and your plan for the year and this should speak to the development of the younger ones and all the way up to the elderly. If you put in that youth programme, it is almost guaranteed that you will be able to compete at a high level internationally.”

Provides better structure

Meanwhile, First Vice President of the BVI Olympic Committee Neville ‘Sheep’ Smith also believes such an organisation is needed.

He said once it is established, government will be better positioned to fund structured programmes that will have a lasting impact on the development of sports in the BVI.

“You have to make a mandate that it must happen because these are the things that make you better, that when you start organising a four-year plan that you have five tournaments after you get six qualifiers to go to these five tournaments. Things like that need to be put in place and then when the budget comes in, you tell them if you’re not putting these things in place, you cannot be getting money from government,” Smith explained while giving a brief example.

“If you’re missing tournaments, why fund it? Why should government give you money to just play a regular league? It has to be more than a regular league. It has to be qualifiers then you get into different tournaments and training. Budgets have to be put in place for those things, through organisations,” Smith added.

He further said he believes that the Olympic Committee should be the entity to have oversight over the National Sports Council.

“We need to plan it in a way that when we doing sports; have somebody to keep that other organisation to par. I think the Olympic Committee should be part of that, keeping that organisation to par like paying the dues attaining to proper tournaments, qualifiers and stuff like that.”